European Resistance Archive/European Resistance Archive (ERA)

– you can still see one of the airplanes we made, it’s at the Reggio Emilia airport –

so the young workers of Reggiane who were called into the Army were entitled to serve in the Air Force,

while those who worked at Lombardini Motori, manufacturing ship engines, usually served in the Navy.

I was called up for military service, went to Bologna and then to Orvieto, where I completed the recruit training.

After that, we were transferred to different places.

I was sent to an airport near Rome, in a small village called Furbara.

Our units were sent to mount guard in Rome,

so we went to Palazzo Venezia.

Throughout the week, every night a different unit was in charge of this:

one night it was the Air Force, one night the artillerymen, and so on.

So we went to mount guard, and I remember that a new lieutenant came to pick us up with a van at eight in the morning,

and told us we would be visiting Rome for a while since he had never been there before.

I went back inside the airport. The mail had arrived and there were also some letters for me.

I went to my sleeping quarter and was opening a letter when my lieutenant,

a man from Ancona whose name was Santaroni, came over. He was a good man – he gave me a hug later –

who had come to tell me that “somebody needed to speak to me”.

It was three policemen.

The first thing the sergeant did was take the letter I held in my hands.

In the letter, my mother had written the following words:

“You’re lucky to be in the Army, since in the past few days Pattaccini, Boiardi and others were arrested”.